Bradley Manning Charged With ‘Aiding the Enemy,’ Other Dumb Things

Private First Class Bradley Manning faces twenty-two “new” charges, including “aiding the enemy” and probably “complaining too much about being tortured, what a weenie.” (Army people refused to identify the “enemy” Manning is allegedly aiding. Surprise!) Brad Manning is still in solitary confinement at the Quantico Marine Fun Palace, so we’re sure that these new Aiding Lord Voldemort charges are music to his ears — if his American interrogators haven’t cut his ears off yet, which we suspect is probably Standard Operating Procedure at most military rape prisons these days. “So it goes.” [NYT/CNN]

A freedom-hating Pakistani judge ordered that the trial of Raymond Davis should proceed, even though Davis is “a respectable diplomat” or whatever Barack Obama and The New York Times called him. Davis has yet to be formally charged, and the “immunity” issue is still being considered by the Lahore High Court. [AP]

About the author

Riley is an "internet blogger." He has written for such internet websites as True/Slant and the terrible Brangelina gossip emporium "The Huffington Post." Riley lives in northeast DC, near H Street. Maybe you do too and want to hang out?

I am sure the post office is hiring consultants to figure out how to plan the next rate hike at this time.

OneDollarJuana

Complain all you like, postage rates don't go up any more than inflation. Check it out.

Lascauxcaveman

As long as i can still get multiple credit card offers each and every Saturday, I am willing to pay any price.

Negropolis

There are but a few things in this world I'd consider underpriced, and the services of the USPS are one of them, if you ask me.

http://whateveritisimagainstit.blogspot.com trampndirtdown

So spreading gossip about Hills is " aiding the enemy" but shipping pallets of cash to the Taliban is A O.K. got it.

rileywaggs

Bingo!

http://whateveritisimagainstit.blogspot.com trampndirtdown

Well then it's a good thing for the Taliban that the Republicans are making sure they won't have to pay any taxes on their stacks-o-paper.

http://wonkette.com/ weejee

And all those 20s burn real well to keep the chill away on those cold Afghan winter nights.

SorosBot

When the case against Daniel Ellsberg was thrown out of court, it was not because his leak of the Pentagon Papers was legal (it wasn't; the publican was legal, though), but because all the evidence against him had been obtained illegally by Nixon's plumbers and was inadmissible in court. Now I'm pretty sure that evidence obtained through torture is likewise inadmissible, just saying.

bureaucrap

it's only inadmissable in an american court. That's why pfc manning is going to be tried in Yemen, where he was born.

Worthly Wokette Skum

This is pre-9/11 thinking.

freakishlywrong

Anyone else seeing weird shit as far as commenting? Is it the enemy?

Come here a minute

NO BAILOUT for the fatcats of BIG POSTAL.

mereoblivion

If a respected diplomat can't claim immunity from prosecution for murdering people, who can these days?

http://ifthethunderdontgetya.blogspot.com/ ifthethunderdontgetya

Army people refused to identify the “enemy” Manning is allegedly aiding. Surprise!

Oh, that's an easy one!

Amerkin people who want to know what we're actually spending those trillions of dollars overseas on are "The Enemy".
~

MildMidwesterner

I believe the "Enemy" that you are looking for is anyone competing with Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Lockheed, Halliburton, Exxon, etc….

Meh, they all look the same to me. Swedes are just Aussies without a tan, oh, and a knack for making crappy-ass furniture.

OneDollarJuana

The Enemy is "Truth".

DaSandman

So, we're against torture except when we're for it. Welcome to the late Roman Empire…

TanzbodenKoenig

needs moar buttsecks

SorosBot

The Romans also went from "torture is OK against foreigners" to "torture is OK against traitors" to "torture is OK against the Emperor's political enemies, or anyone he suspects of being an enemy" to "torture is OK whenever the emperor thinks it's fun" fairly quickly. I'm beginning to see some scary parallels here. Well at least we don't use the same animal as our national symbol or anything…

Worthly Wokette Skum

And there arose, in the far reaches empire, a very special man, some said an angel, a tard anyway, born in a meth house, to an intellectual virgin. And three wise pundits traveled to his cradle, bearing gifts. An that day a star arose in the Fox that shone throughout the land. And he preached the gospel or righteosness until he was crucified by the press.

freakishlywrong

I have seen the enemy and it is Republicans.

http://hong-kong-actresses.blogspot.com/ donner_froh

Aiding the enemy = Exposing information that helped rival State Department drones in career warfare against those named in the cables.

OneDollarJuana

Speaking of drones. When do you think we'll see the first "accident" in which an unarmed aerial vehicle bombs a liberal target in the US?

Negropolis

Hell, they already have them patroling the U.S. Canadian border along the Detroit and St. Clair Rivers between Michigan and Ontario, so I'd give it a few months. I mean, it'll be too easy to resist, you know, with Detroit having liberals who also happen to be black, and a good third of them under the poverty line. And, on the other side you have Canadians. So, that's like gravy.

mumbly_joe

Speaking of the State Department being in the bombing-shooty business:

does anyone else think it's weird that our government blurs the lines between "lawful combatants" (i.e, uniformed members of the military, carrying weapons openly, who are exempted from some of the normal civil laws, because war means shooting at people and killing them) and "civilians" (who get charged with things like "murder") in pretty much exactly the same way we claimed that the terrists/insurgents do, when we made up that totally fictional third "unlawful combatant" category, to detain them indefinitely and torture them?

I ask, because I wonder if it occurred to anyone that that might backfire on our "diplomats" and CIA joystick jockeys, who kinda look a lot like "unlawful combatants", as far as anyone else is concerned.

EatsBabyDingos

Ahhh. "So it goes," the sign off phrase of Linda Ellerby, the last broadcast journalist that I wished was related to me.

TREASONOUS MISLOCATION OF STAPLERS ON OFFICIAL GOVERNMENT DESKS IN AID AND COMFORT OF THE ENEMY

FAILURE TO PLEAT TROUSERS

CRIMINAL USE OF LADY GAGA IN A PUBLIC PLACE

EXTRAORDINARY INABILITY TO SEE HOW THIS WAS NOT GOING TO WORK OUT IN HIS FAVOR WHILE THE SKINNY WHITE GUY WOULD GET A BOOK DEAL

http://hong-kong-actresses.blogspot.com/ donner_froh

While Manning is the victim of a frame-up and clearly a scapegoat for a number of things, any use of lady gaga in a public place should be criminalized.

neiltheblaze

We're lookin' at YOU, Grammy Awards.

Numbat_Dundee

Ok, I get it now. I thought Assange was “the enemy”. If it’s Lady Gaga then all this makes sense. A war on terror was always a silly idea, but a war on talentless media-whores gets my vote everytime. Turn Hollywood into Fallujah! Take out the Beckham’s with a drone! The possibilities are endless.

MARCdMan

Interestingly the charge relating to the trousers carries the death penalty, the others are just a fine.

Negropolis

CRIMINAL USE OF LADY GAGA IN A PUBLIC PLACE

Is there any other use for her in a public space but criminal?

http://hong-kong-actresses.blogspot.com/ donner_froh

Despite significant cost-cutting, the U.S. Postal Service has "an inflexible business model"

I wonder if anyone ever thought of having a government department with the sole job of delivering mail to everyone in the country because it is one of the services that the government would offer.

Probably way too radical even to consider.

twaingirl

THE MARKET MUST HAVE A VOICE!

SorosBot

It's always been an indefensible business model, because it's not profitable to deliver to small rural communities and isolated homes; that's why FedEx and UPS won't deliver to rural areas, and why the post office was created in the first place instead of leaving it to the market. That's why insisting that it be run like a profit-seeking business is ridiculous; see also Amtrak (but we don't insist the interstate highways make a profit; in fact the Feds let people use them for free).

BaldarTFlagass

Try sending a first class letter in a European country. some of them countries charge up to a dollar or more for a letter within the same country, and the still don't make any profit.

SorosBot

Hell, if we got rid of the profit requirements we could see a lot less annoying junk mail (and waste a lot less paper in the bargain); the USPS bends over backwards to please the mass mailing companies because they are their biggest of revenue.

OneDollarJuana

Hmmm, let's run government like a business, make all those Republican voters in rural areas pay the actual cost for their roads and electrical grid and see how long they keep that philosophy.

DashboardBuddha

Is it me, or does anyone else think that American Exceptionalism is a sick joke?

deanbooth

Why did American Exceptionalism cross the road?
To get to the other sigh.

[I'm doing a lot of sighing these days.]

Negropolis

I began a laugh, and then it turned into a sadz. :(

sezme

Everyone else thinks that American Exceptionalism is a sick joke. Except Americans. Hence the name.

http://www.wonkette.com ManchuCandidate

Exactly.

http://hong-kong-actresses.blogspot.com/ donner_froh

Well, there is that whole thing about every empire with global (or what was considered global at the time, i.e. Rome) simply knew that its way of life and innate goodness showed it was destined to rule the world.

You may be on to something. Expect to be blown up or imprisoned by neo-con lackeys soon.

SorosBot

Well the Romans wanted to spread democracy and reason throughout the known world, and in doing so destroyed their own democracy and reason in Rome. But that could never happen here.

Bezoar

Rome was driven by unrestrained mercantilism, as are we, and it appealed to 'Rome exceptionalism' when that was useful in duping either its own citizens or those of other regions. Had the Romans developed the corporation, they would have become a corporatocracy, instead of a 'family-ocracy' of merchant princes (or assholes, depending on your perspective).

Weenus299

I get more knowledge massages here than just about anywhere else on the Internetz.

I'm not sure what a "Bobby Jindal" is, but it sounds like a kinky, Southern sex act.

glamourdammerung

It clearly involves "The Brady Bunch", an Indian exorcist, and poop.

http://wonkette.com/ weejee

The key to the sillysauce of American Exceptionalism is Jerry Lewis being the French people's favorite actor. Why oh, why you may ask? Well, when I've asked my Froggy friends that very questions and they all said because on the screen he is the archetypal American. Iffin' that ain't exceptional, what is?

BarryOPotter

It's funny that Americans crack on the French for adorning J. Lewis with the Legion of H., when the whole time, the French were taking the piss out of the Amerloques. Quel snark!

He's just in a pissy mood because some tea bagger told him that, in fact, bird was not the word. Weeping eagle is just too damn sensitive.

Bezoar

Maybe in the end Bradley Manning will have succeeded at one of the great humanitarian acts of the 21st century.

MsQuasimodo

Win! That's all I got.

sezme

Raymond Davis is the Charlie Sheen of respectable diplomats.

Beowoof

If the republicans let the Post Office go bankrupt, then how will my bills delivered to me?

neiltheblaze

See? That's what I always suspected. My bills are the fault of the Post Office!

BarryOPotter

…how will my bills be delivered to me?

Pigeons. Remember, the plan is to push this country back into feudalism. So soon, you won't have to wait to receive bills, just be sure to answer your hovel door when the tax man comes knocking, assuming you're home and not in the fields gather the day's quota of shit…

Negropolis

Oh, they'll make you pay for postage from some private company.

chickensmack

The Postal Service is a valid and important media to this day. But they should stick to the first-class stamp, and get rid of everything else. No more priority mail, or "if it fits, it ships."

FedEx and UPS can fuck up my packages just as well as the government can.

http://whateveritisimagainstit.blogspot.com trampndirtdown

Yeah, let's get rid of those public universities too, Check in to Cash U. is good enough fer me.

Weenus299

At one time the college from which I was graduated offered me an education and took my money. Now, this same institution is essentially a moneylender with books.

CapeClod

I suppose that exposing the American State Department's obsession with Batman and Robin comparisons aids the enemy in some way.

TanzbodenKoenig

We have to trample on Manning's civil rights guys, for freedom!

http://intensedebate.com/people/mrblifil mrblifil

Plus his name's a little gay, like borderline porn-star-ish. He needs to spend some time thinking about that before he gets the chance to earn back our respect.

Negropolis

Plus he is a gay, so he needs to be treated even less humanely. Honestly, if this had been some good, ole boy from Alabama, you'd be hearing even conservatives scream about his treatment, no matter the charge.

http://vinoverve.com maman

Shhhh. Don’t say He Who Must Not Named’s name!

Mumbletypeg

"The Army said Wednesday that the delay was to evaluate Private Manning’s “mental capacity” at the defense’s request. That evaluation is pending, it said."
This is what burns me up: "pending." They've dragged this long just to green-light a mental evaluation. This is what the asshats between the judicial & military complexes amount to.

Weenus299

I was a fat slob soldier with bad knees, and all the people around me carried on that I was ruining the army. It "only" took me six months to get kicked out. UCMJ wasn't even a part of it. I'll bet had the UCMJ was applied, I would be in so long I'd get a pension.

Mumbletypeg

Sort of OT: I'm going to east VA tonight where a friend is still being detained, having completed his 14-yr sentence for armed burglary, all w/ good behavior & got a degree & did the inmate-dog-training thing — only to have INS transfer him into a detention center with others waiting to be deported. Reason: he was born in Cambodia. He is in his 15th month of post-sentence detainment, with release *pending* Cambodia's willingness to have him sent there – for the 1st time since he was 10. Family fled the Pol Pot atrocity & put their kids thru US public schools, all surviving siblings & parent now naturalized & settled in TX. He has now paid his due at age 43 and, IMO, reformed & no danger to society. Zero reason to associate him w/ suspected 'terrorists' except to make some official look good for shipping non-natives out whenever s/he can… [cont'd]

Mumbletypeg

…Attempts to get answers from ICE resulted in mere hem-haw about Cambodian gov't sitting on *their* hands, "We can't make official decision on releasing your friend til they agree to take him" — but if they won't take him, his 14 years' of taxpayer-funded incarceration isn't enough to legitimize his release. "Pending"- – god how I hate that word.
The confinement of these 15 months, cell-bound for all but 4 hrs./day (for meals/tv/phone calls), with Lockdowns sporadically announced w/o reason or warning, no library access but 2x/month, have just about put him over the brink. My correspondence w/ him has been like watching a mental breakdown in slow motion b/c we're trying to boost his hopes yet the mixed signals neither affirm nor deny hope, just prolong suffering and cost of confinement without sufficient grounds for detainment.
/OT sorry but, and I'm aware Manning's situaion is singular — but I'm spooked by what I might see when I go visit my friend tonight for the 1st time since he got put into extended detainment there 15 mos. ago.

BaldarTFlagass

That shit is more fucked up than mere words can describe. Good luck to your bud.

Weenus299

The USPS could hike the stamp up to a dollar and I'd still pay for stamps. The fact they could take a piece of my cum-stained and pubic-hair laden stationery in Columbia SC and fly it out to unsuspecting senior-citizen persons in Monterey California for the mere cost of 44 cents never ceases to amaze me.

PsycWench

http://www.etiquettehell.com had a great story a few days ago about a wedding at which there were signs that the couple were forgoing thank-you notes and donating the costs of the notes and postage to charity. I suppose that sounded impressive to some people until you realize that they ducked a fairly serious obligation in return for donating less than $100.

Texan_Bulldog

Sounds like they were just lazy to me. Don't have to write hundreds of thank you notes for crap you don't like & will never use (when's the last time you pulled out your gravy boat?) PLUS no paying for postage on those thank you notes that were never written. Win/Win! (Is the name of that couple 'Palin'?)

PsycWench

If the couple were "Palin" they'd have charged money to attend the wedding.

BaldarTFlagass

Writing thank you notes is the reason I have remained single. Well, one of the reasons.

Steverino247

I pulled my gravy boat out just yesterday. Didn't catch any gravy, though…

http://andrewdrinker.wordpress.com andrewdrinker

Don't we pay the least for postage in the Western world? Why not raise the price of a first-class letter to fifty cents or more? How about a dollar?

mumbly_joe

Wait, who is "the enemy" here? Did we declare war on Wikileaks when I wasn't paying attention? Or are we counting third-order, "he shared it with someone who published it and then any yahoo with an internet account could hypothetically google it, even a hypothetical enemy of some sort, even though we're not going to bother to prove that anything like that actually happened."

And, if the latter, when do we plan on executing whoever it was that green-lit Geraldo being embedded with the troops? Or whoever that "high-ranking Pentagon official" who keeps talking to the New York Times is?

PublicLuxury

Brad Manning should have went into football like his brothers instead of the military. Yeesh.

http://intensedebate.com/people/mrblifil mrblifil

Well if the President is okay with how Bradley Manning is being treated, then that's just fine with me!

ttommyunger

Having worked in Law Enforcement throughout the last ten or fifteen years of the Hoover Era, I am no stranger to the sinister and real extra-judicial powers of the State. I do, however, feel a new unease with the knowledge that now, for the first time in my 70 years of life, my Country can arrest, hold and interrogate me indefinitely without charge, court appearance or counsel all under color of Law. We are through the Looking Glass, folks, and it ain't pretty.

snoopyfan2010

Whoa! That's only true if you're on the "enemy's" side. If you're a Real American, you have nothing to fear. Okay?

ttommyunger

Uhhhh…Sure……OKay.

chascates

The Post Office is broke and can't pay its bills. How about auctioning off pieces of mail instead of delivering them? Or, instead of employees 'going postal' they could commit armed robberies when they do deliver mail.

These are the out-of-the-box ideas that Speaker Gingrich would be proud of.

http://kittenbomb.wordpress.com kittenbomb

Now that I get my porn from the Internet, I find it harder to care about the Post Office. I want to, it’s just…what was I talking about?

Negropolis

Before I even clicked on this, this was like "who's the "enemy"?"

I want to be surprised that this administration is allowing this kind of treatment of Manning, but I'm not. Surely, they feel we have to keep up appearances, but the particular treatment of Manning is over-the-top and beyond shameful.

Sorry, I don't got no snark on this one, my friends.

BTW, I've been arguing for years instead of raising stamp prices by a penny or two, every couple of years, why not just raise it by nickles or dimes when increases come? Given the decreased volume in mail, I'm sure most would be willing to pay 50 or even 75 cents to send a letter. Of course that's not going to come very close to fixing their fiscal issues, but it'd help along the margins.